Kaban ni D_BystandeR: LAKBIT SAYSAY BAHIN KABAHIN SA SABAH

In 1704, the Sultan of Brunei, in gratitude for help extended to him by the Sultan of Sulu in suppressing a revolt, the Sultan of Brunei ceded North Borneo to the Sulu Sultan. In 1878, a keen Austrian adventurer, Baron de Overbeck , went to Sulu and persuaded the Sultan of Sulu to lease to him, for Malayan $5,000 yearly rental (equivalent to $1,600, the existing rate of exchange in 1963 from dollar to peso) of the territory now in question. Overbeck later sold out his rights under the contract to Alfred Dent, an English Merchant, who established a provisional association and later a  company, known as the British North Borneo Company, which assumed all the rights and obligations under the 1878 contract. This company was awarded a Royal Charter in 1881. Protest against the grant of the charter was lodged by the Spanish and Dutch governments and  in reply the British government clarified its position and stated in unmistakable language that "sovereignty" remains with the Sultan of Sulu" and that the company was merely an administering authority. In 1946, the British North Borneo Company transferred all its rights and obligations to the British Crown on July 10, 1946 - just six days after Philippine independence - asserted full sovereignty rights over North Borneo as of that date. Shortly thereafter former American Governor General Francis Burton Harrison, then special adviser to the government on foreign affairs denounced the cession order as unilateral act in violation of legal rights. In 1950, Congressman Macapagal along with Congressman Arsenio Lacson and Arturo Tolentino - sponsored a resolution urging the formal institution of the claim to North Borneo. Prolonged studies were in the meanwhile undertaken and  in 1962 the House of Representatives, in rare unanimity,  passed a resolution urging the President of the Philippines to recover North Borneo consistent with international law and procedure. 

Acting on this unanimous resolution and having acquired all the rights and interests of the Sultanate of Sulu, the Representatives of the Philippines, through the President filed the claim to North Borneo. - Excerpts from the speech delivered by Senator Jovito Salonga in March 1963.